The general education curriculum has two broad objectives. It seeks to educate students in some general skills or approaches to knowledge. And it seeks to engage them in the intellectual work of a variety of disciplines across the arts and sciences.
In following this curriculum, you will be guided by two kinds of degree requirements corresponding to these broad objectives. One deals with general approaches, and the other with specific fields of knowledge. Within any given course, these two—an approach and a field of study—are integral to one another. An approach is learned by practicing it in relation to a field of knowledge. For instance, your ability to use a foreign language is developed through coming to understand the culture in which the language is rooted. Understanding a work of art is acquired by figuring out how to write about it, that is, by learning how to use words to describe, compare, question, and argue about works of art and the contexts in which they are created and appreciated. One learns how to analyze quantitative data by thinking about what they mean for our knowledge of actual phenomena that they characterize. Although the two are integral to any given course, some courses give priority to developing skills and approaches, while others give priority to a field under investigation.
Among the College's general education degree requirements, six pertain more to the foundational skills or approaches. We call these "Foundational Approaches." Another set of seven requirements pertains more to sectors or fields of knowledge. We call these "Sector Requirements."
The Foundational Approaches are:
- Writing
- Foreign Language
- Quantitative Data Analysis
- Formal Reasoning and Analysis
- Cross-Cultural Analysis
- Cultural Diversity in the U.S.
- Society
- History & Tradition
- Arts & Letters
- Humanities & Social Sciences
- Living World
- Physical World
- Natural Science and Mathematics
